Rahul claims fraudulent voter additions, deletions, alleges EC 'complicit'

NEW DELHI: Over a month after his "vote chori" allegation about Mahadevapura, Congress MP Rahul Gandhi claimed Thursday that fraudulent voter additions and deletions are being done on a mass scale across states by impersonating voters in booths that favour Congress.

He alleged the operation is being run through a centralised system, and applications are being filled through a software. Rahul also claimed Congress is now getting information about malpractices from "inside the Election Commission "

Rahul's claim revolved around Aland in Karnataka where he said deletion of 6,018 votes was attempted ahead of the 2023 assembly polls in 10 booths of which eight were "strong" for Congress. As the Karnataka CID is probing the case, Rahul accused Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar of protecting those "who are murdering democracy" by not giving information - destination IP from where the forms were filled, device destination ports from where these applications were filed and OTP trails - despite CID asking EC 18 times. He demanded that Kumar provide the details sought in a week's time.

He also cited the example of the Rajoura assembly constituency in Maharashtra where 6,850 "voter addition" were attempted fraudulently using the same modus operandi as Aland.

At a press conference titled "Vote Chori Factory: The Aland Files", Rahul showed purported applications for fraudulent voter deletion, with examples of Godabai, Nagraj and Suryakant, who were said to have filed applications for deletion of some voters. They denied ever doing so.

Drawing a pattern, he said voter deletion was carried with phones from outside the state, and in the name of the voter marked first in the list in a booth.

Amid heightened anticipation, Rahul said the vote deletion expose on Thursday was not the "hydrogen bomb" of "vote chori" that he had earlier said he would drop, but mentioned that the "H-bomb" would come soon. He said by the time Congress ends the presentations on 'vote chori" in two to three months, the country would be convinced that votes are being stolen in state after state.

Rahul said his job is to participate in democracy and not to protect it, but he is having to do so because other institutions are not discharging their duty. He urged "the legal system" to look into the details.

"EC is not giving these details because it will lead us to where the operation is being done from. We know where it is being done from," he said.

"This is solid proof that Gyanesh Kumar is protecting the people who are doing this. Who is doing it? CEC Gyanesh is not telling the CID of Karnataka who is doing this. There are many such cases," he said, adding, "EC has to give the data of IP and OTP within a week, else we will know Gyanesh Kumar is protecting those destroying our democracy."

Rahul said this operation has been done in UP, Haryana and other states, and the voters targeted are mostly from social groups tilted towards Congress like Dalits, tribals, backwards.